In these
times of turmoil, I wish you all the best, and join with people worldwide
who hope for peace and healing.

As I had
hoped, Mary Gail Frawley-O'Dea has given me permission to post a copy
of her letter to acting bishop Richard Lennon, protesting attempts by
lawyers for the Boston Archdiocese to depose therapists of victims/survivors
of clergy sexual abuse. The letter was printed in the Boston Globe. It
follows, with the list of professionals who signed it.

We the undersigned
are clinicians, authors, clergy, and/or researchers who have been active
in the area of psychological trauma, including childhood sexual abuse,
for many years. We are writing from deep concern about the decision of
the Archdiocese of Boston to depose therapists with whom you have contracted
to provide clinical services to adult survivors of sexual abuse by priests.

The psychotherapist-patient
relationship and the healing process therein are successful only to the
extent that the therapy is impervious to disruptive impingements from
others. In order to heal, any patient must be assured that conversations
taking place in the consultation room are confidential. Under ordinary
circumstances, confidentiality is broken only if the patient intends to
harm herself/himself or someone else, and/or if the patient discloses
that a minor is being abused or neglected. Most therapists make these
exceptions to confidentiality clear to a patient early on. Although confidentiality
is always sacred, it is even more so with patients whose bodies, minds,
and souls already have been betrayed by loved and trusted figures in their
lives.

We who are
experienced in working with former victims of sexual abuse must assert
that your willingness to allow your attorneys to invade the confidentiality
of a survivor’s psychotherapeutic treatment by deposing his or her
therapist is an act of reabuse. In June of this year in a nationally televised
speech in Dallas, Bishop Wilton Gregory, the President of The United States
Conference of Catholic Bishops invited all victims of sexual abuse by
clergy to come forward and he pledged the commitment of the American Catholic
Church to help these members of the faithful heal. He said, “If
there is anyone who has been a victim of sexual abuse by a priest or representative
of the Church in the United States and has not yet reported this fact,
I ask you to report it to the Bishop of your diocese and to the appropriate
civil authorities. Though this may be a very difficult step for you, the
Church does love you and wants to help you find justice and healing.”
Many dioceses, including Boston, made similar pleas. Often, victims coming
forward have been offered psychotherapy as one reparative gesture provided
by the Church. Many victims, perhaps hoping to restore their faith in
the compassion and good will of the Church they still love, indeed stepped
forward and availed themselves of the promised assistance. At the time,
they were not informed that if they also were involved in litigation with
the Church, their therapy conversations would be subject to depositions.
Is it not painfully apparent to you that to call forth victims whose therapies
you then allow to be penetrated and dismantled reenacts the seduction
and abuse perpetrated by the original abuser?

In addition
to revictimizing already traumatized victims of clergy abuse, subjecting
therapists to depositions also traumatizes them. It is a shock for any
therapist to experience the invasion of his or her consultation room by
attorneys seeking information about a patient that may be used to discredit
him or her in legal proceedings. Moreover, responding to subpoenas, preparing
for and enduring depositions, and later perhaps having to testify in court
removes the therapist from his or her own practice, thus disrupting the
treatments of even more patients. Finally, in most cases, the therapy
with the trauma survivor will be permanently harmed by the intrusion of
the legal system.

Those who
are in relationship with trauma survivors sometimes experience themselves
as victims while survivors can end up subjectively feeling like abusers.
While the Archdiocese of Boston has a legal right to pursue the depositions
of therapists treating abuse survivors in litigation with the Church,
it is crucial for Church officials to remember that these suits have emerged
from the sexual abuse of minors by priests and, often, only after years
of stonewalling efforts by the hierarchy. We hope that you will reconsider
your decision to retraumatize the already broken members of your flock
and will choose to pursue a pastoral rather than corporate and counter-litigious
path.

In 1956,
Chairman Mao launched in China the “Let One Hundred Flowers Bloom”
campaign. In it, he asked that the citizens of China freely discuss their
reactions to his regime. It was all a ruse. As people gratefully reached
for what they perceived to be an outstretched hand, many ended up slaughtered
or imprisoned. To invite adults who were tragically betrayed by priests
and by your predecessor bishops to come forward to be helped only to betray
them again is cruelly reminiscent of Mao’s tactics. Please do not
do this to your wounded faithful.